What is the secret to the success of Novak Djokovic? Well, don’t be surprised if you hear the name Jelena Ristic. Coz she is the peace in the middle of all the chaos for Djokovic. They met each other in high school and began dating in 2005. Then, after almost eight years, the couple got engaged, and on 10 July 2014, they married each other at Sveti Stefan in Montenegro. There’s more to their story than meets the eye. Believe it or not, their love story once reached new heights, quite literally.

During a conversation on ‘In Depth with Graham Bensinger‘, the tennis star revealed how he made a sweet marriage proposal to Jelena. Elaborating on the same Djokovic revealed, “She thought we were going hiking or something like this, but we went for a hot-air balloon ride. I arranged another hot-air balloon in the distance so that when we were coming closer to it, it rises and released the banner sign ‘Will you marry me’.” After seeing this Jelena was like,

“Are we meant to meet another hot-air balloon on our way and he goes like no this is awkward what’s happening,” Jelena explained. “And then the thing goes down and I’m reading it slowly because it’s letter up.” She added, “I’m like what will you marry me? But I’m like it’s a commercial? Is he crazy at 7:00 am? Why would want to put a commercial out? It’s not a commercial banner and he’s already down on the knee.”

Djokovic later on stated that Jelena keeps on telling him that she knows him so well that he cannot surprise her. However, he’s glad that it worked that time because it was a stepping stone to a beautiful ten-year-long love story. Earlier this week, the couple celebrated their tenth wedding anniversary. Djokovic marked the occasion with a heartfelt Instagram post featuring a beautiful video of them together and a touching poem:

However, do know there was another awkward moment featuring the same couple on their first outing?

“I wanted to impress her” – Djokovic recalls his shaky start to their beautiful love story

In 2016, Djokovic revealed how nearly blew his chances with Jelena after their first date in Monte Carlo at a sports bar. He wanted to impress Jelena, so he took her to a very good restaurant. However, she wasn’t too impressed by the choice of venue, and neither did she like what Novak had ordered for her. Recalling those moments, Jelena said, “Awkward moment, he wanted to order for me and it wasn’t what I expected.”

He had ordered steak for her because he thought it was her favorite dish. However, he was a bit shocked when he realized his mistake and learned that it was a plate of raw meat that was served to him. Djokovic said, “I called the waiter over and explained the steak was underdone.” To level up his embarrassment a little further, the waiter replied, “You ordered the steak tartare it’s always served raw.”

However, thankfully for Novak, Jelena wasn’t too much offended by it and that moment later on made up for a funny story to tell surrounding their first date. They get reminded of that moment whenever they go to a restaurant and see a steak tartare on the menu.